Ulrich von Hassell

Ulrich von Hassell ( Anklam , Pomerania , December from November of 1881 – Berlin , 8 of September of 1944 ) was a German diplomat during World War II and active member of the German Resistance against Nazism . Member of the plot of July 20 of 1944 , was sentenced to the death penalty and hanged the same day.

Trajectory

He was the son of Lieutenant Ulrich von Hassell and studied laws between 1899-1903 in Lausanne , Tübingen and Berlin . He spent some time in the Chinese colonies and as a diplomat in London .

In 1911, he married Ilse von Tirpitz, daughter of Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz , with whom he had four children. In 1911 he was appointed consul in Genoa , Italy .

In World War I was wounded in the battle of the Marne and soon it worked in the biography of his father-in-law, of which he was secretary.

In 1918 he joined the Popular Party ( Deutschnationale Volkspartei or DNVP). He was assigned as a diplomat until 1932 in positions in Rome , Barcelona , Copenhagen and Belgrade . In 1932, he was appointed ambassador to the Kingdom of Italy .

In 1933, he became a member of the Nazi party despite being in complete opposition to the alliance with Italy and Japan , because of his desire for the unity of Christian and European countries, since he was knight of justice of the Order of San Juan Of the Bailiwick of Brandenburg , a German society of Protestant hidalgos. In 1938, due to the Blomberg-Fritsch affair , he was suspended as ambassador by Adolf Hitler himself .

From the beginning of World War II he began to conspire against Hitler, as nexus between Carl Friedrich Goerdeler and Ludwig Beck , and the Kreisau Circle , planning together with Beck and Johannes Popitz the organization of the post-Hitler era.

He participated in several plots of 1943, but was not directly linked to the plans of Claus von Stauffenberg . However, on July 29, 1944, he was arrested by the Gestapo for his alleged connection to the July 20 plot .

On 8 September he was tried in the People’s Court ( Volksgerichtshof ), presided over by Roland Freisler , sentenced to death and executed on the same day in Plötzensee-Berlin.

Ulrich von Hassell is the grandfather of the historian Agostino von Hassell .